


under me you quite so new

by Margo_Kim



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Comfort, Feelings Realization, M/M, Morning After, Morning Sex, Tenderness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-23
Updated: 2017-12-23
Packaged: 2019-02-14 09:31:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13004874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Margo_Kim/pseuds/Margo_Kim
Summary: Morning sex is a thing they do now that Dorian doesn't leave, and it turns out maybe they do more as well.Bull is not an idiot. He tries not to be anyway, though there's something about Dorian that makes him a little stupider, a little lazier than usual. Dorian's prone to decadence when he lets himself feel safe enough to be, and maybe it's just the novelty of Dorian being decadent with him that makes Bull indulge.





	under me you quite so new

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Melime](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melime/gifts).



> Hi, Melime! I got very emotional about your prompt of Dorian taking care of Bull's old wounds, I hope you enjoy :)

Bull is not an idiot. He tries not to be anyway, though there's something about Dorian that makes him a little stupider, a little lazier than usual. Dorian's prone to decadence when he lets himself feel safe enough to be, and maybe it's just the novelty of Dorian being decadent with him that makes Bull indulge. Indulging is a bas concept, an imperfection that Tevinter has perfected, and Dorian is perfect at whatever he sets his mind to. This morning he's set his mind to kissing every inch of Bull's chest, like Bull's a tray of hors d'oeuvres and what a waste it would be to miss a treat. Dorian's lips have navigated from his shoulders down to the bottom of Bull's rib cage with unhurried precision. He's miles more to go, but Dorian takes his time. He stops now and then to nap against some bit of skin that particularly pleased him. Sprawled on top of Bull, legs tangled together, he rests his head in the valley of the ribcage where ever breakable floating ribs grasp at and miss the sternum. Bull's broken those damn ribs enough times to know where they are. Dorian's thumb traces the permanent ridge in Bull's skin where the bone jutted out one time. Hell of a mess. Better the skin then the lungs, Bull knows that. It's a good scar. All scars are good scars. They say you survived.

Still. Bull's not an idiot. He knows how they must look to Dorian.  

It looks like it, but Dorian's not asleep, not quite. He's just slow waking up in the mornings. Bull knows that for sure now Dorian doesn't leave in the night. He takes his time. He stirs for hours if you let him. In the early hours of the day, gravity hangs on him heavier than it does Bull. At six in the morning, Dorian's five hundred pounds and half molded into the mattress. He lightens as the sun rises. By noon he's back to standard density, flesh and bone that floats in water and floats off beds. Dorian doesn't get to sleep till noon most days, unless he was working until five in the morning, in which case he usually doesn't come to Bull's bed. He and Bull pass each other in the courtyard on mornings like that, Dorian leaving his research for his bed, Bull leaving his bed for practice grounds. They've met like this since Haven, since Dorian refused to look at him when he passed, when Bull liked to puff himself up a little taller, wider, bigger just to see if Dorian would blush. They didn't talk, except for all the times they did. They weren't friends, except for the ways that they were. But it was different then, before this, before Dorian had a choice of beds to sleep in. Dorian likes to sleep in Bull's rooms some mornings, when Bull's not there. He says it's warmer than his own, unless he and Bull have finished having sex and Dorian wants an excuse not to leave, in which case he says that Bull's room is too cold for him to even consider getting out from underneath the covers.

Now in the mornings they meet each other passing, they share breakfast. Dorian's last meal of the day, Bull's first. It's a good ending and beginning. But not as good at this, as one morning synced up. Dorian's lying face down and naked, which is a sight everyone should get to see before they die. He's got a back like the Hissing Wastes. Golden, undulating, leading to the impossible horizon. Sort of sight that makes you think about things like gods. Like the world's bigger than anyone could have ever told you. He's got a back that looks like grandeur, all muscles and sinew and dimples down low, a spine running up and down like a viper. All that deadly beauty, all that coiled strength. And black fuzz like storm clouds on his lower back. It's the softest hair Bull's ever pressed his face into, except for the hair on Dorian's chest, which isn't nearly as soft as the hair on Dorian's head, which ain't got nothing on the hair between his legs. He's a furred man. Makes Bull feel all kinda things. Bull's not a hairy guy. Qunari don't do chest hair. Just as well. It’d get all matted in the vitar.

Anyway, Dorian’s hair still isn’t half as soft as his skin. Skin like bronze, good skin, burnished skin. He looks like he’s never been hurt. Bull knows that’s not true, but it’s a nice thought.

Bull once said to Dorian the thing about his back looking like the Hissing Wastes. When Dorian asked how so, Bull had slapped his ass and said, “Big beautiful moon.”

Bull’s good at reading people, but he was pretty fucking surprised at how hard Dorian laughed.

 “Shall I suck your cock while I’m down here?” Dorian murmurs lazily against Bull’s stomach, his hand idling along Bull’s thighs.

“Look who’s asking nicely,” Bull teases. “Where’s the brat I bought to bed?”

“Still asleep. Inquire again later.” Dorian raises himself up on an elbow, and then dips right back down again as if he can’t resist himself. Kisses Bull’s navel and says, “I doubt you’ve ever cleaned this.”

“I fish a finger in there every year or so.”

“Disgusting,” Dorian says and kisses it again. “I knew a man once who begged to drink champagne from my belly button.”

“Did you let him?”

“I did, generous soul that I am. He got his thimbleful and I finished the bottle.”

Bull pictures Dorian, younger, sprawled on the kind of rich red satin sheets that slide you right off the bed, naked and hard and the froth of some indecently expensive champagne glittering like diamonds in the dark hair running down from his navel.

Dorian, older, entwined in the cheap patchwork cotton sheets that came standard from the quartermaster, but still naked, still hard, grinds against Bull. “Do you like the thought of that?” His grin is so damn smug it makes Bull’s cock ache.

“I like the thought of you,” Bull says, and cups Dorian’s head. Dorian closes his eyes like Bull knew he would. Dorian loves it when Bull holds his head, one of Bull’s hands nearly enough to encompass the skull, it makes Dorian feel small, cherished. He likes the weight of Bull’s hands on the tenderest parts of him. He likes when Bull bruises him, and he likes when Bull holds him softer than Dorian thought possible.

Dorian confessed all this while getting fully fucked out, tied, blindfolded, shaking, panting, straining, keening, gasping, brought to the edge of his endurance and then beyond and beyond again and beyond, until pleasure was a white hot knife against his nerves and he still begged for more. It’s wrong to use a man’s words in those circumstances against him. Bull knows that. Still. Cherished. Bull hadn’t realized that was the truth of it until Dorian sobbed it out, and the words robbed Bull of the shreds of composure he’d held onto. He’d come harder even then Dorian, sent white ropes crisscrossing across the red already strapping Dorian’s chest, and for a moment, a blessed moment, there’d been nothing in Bull’s head. Not duty or fear or Seheron, not his knee screaming for rest or his back which always got shitty when the weather turned or his ears which rang and rang and wouldn’t goddamn stop ringing. There’d been nothing but Dorian following Bull over the edge without touch, twitching limply as he rode out the pleasure of Bull’s pleasure.

This morning, Dorian opens his beautiful eyes again and says, “I think I will suck your cock, if you don’t mind,” and Bull says, “Fuck, Dorian,” and Dorian says, still very smug, “I know.”

Dorian’s mouth is like the rest of Dorian, it’s hot and perfect and it drives Bull wild. Dorian’s good at this, better than any other human Bull’s been with, better than anyone period. Maybe it’s just the practice. Bull can’t think of any mouth he’s known as much as this one. The tamassrans cycled out; a sword can be sharpened by any hand. And the rest here in the south, they have their fun with Bull and Bull has his fun with them, and everyone moves on. Maybe it’s just the staying put. Bull hasn’t had a home base like Skyhold since Seheron, and he wasn’t fucking around much on Seheron. Dorian’s here because it’s convenient for Dorian, and Bull’s here because it’s convenient for Bull, and it’s a good thing they got, convenient for both of them, except _fuck fuck fuck_ convenience doesn’t feel like that, like the wet heat of Dorian’s perfect mouth and the hum of satisfaction that rattles Bull to his core.

Dorian sucks Bull off with his eyes open and swallows Bull down when he’s done. He licks his plum plump lips for any spilled drops. Bull wishes he’d kept his eye patch on last night so he’d still be wearing it this morning. He knows he looks better with his eyepatch on, and Dorian deserves the best he could possibly look at, giving Bull a stare like that. Bedroom eyes, Varric would call them. The kind of eyes that can’t survive outside the gossamer world of morning sex with last night’s fresh aches.

Dorian parts those beautiful lips again and says, “How’s your knee?”

Bull grunts in surprise, and Dorian kisses the crease between thigh and groin before he straightens. “Your pillow talk is crap,” Bull says. He rests his hand on the curve of Dorian’s hip, nods down at the curve of Dorian’s cock. “Why don’t you let me take care of that?”

When Bull sits up, Dorian holds him still. Or at rather, he presses his hand against Bull’s chest in the suggestion of a push and Bull stops. “You took it too hard last night.”

“I didn’t hear you complaining.”

“How could I? I was being cruelly ravished by a merciless brute.”

“Yeah?” Bull can’t help but grin. “Sounds nice.”

Dorian sniffs. He can’t help his smile either. “I know you hurt it. You were stiff all night.”

“Who wouldn’t be stiff with—”

“If you turn one more of my medical diagnoses into an innuendo, I’ll see if you ever ravish me again.”

Bull rakes back the hair that’s flopped down in Dorian’s face.  He hopes he looks lighter than he feels. Dorian frowns at Bull’s knee the way Dorian frowns at his staff or his notes or his robes when they aren’t working for him. Dorian frowns at Bull’s knee like it’s a personal problem.

“I’m quite good at massage,” Dorian says. “A former—well. A friend, I suppose we could call Rilienus that, he had trouble with his knee as well. Of course, he twisted it falling naked and drunk down a flight of marble stairs.”

“Hey, that’s how I busted my knee too.”

Dorian snorts. “The Chargers tell a far more dramatic story.”

“That’s what my boys do.” Bull ponders the possibilities. “Do they say it was a dragon?” It was gaatlok.

“They say it was two flights of stairs. Lie back please.”

Bull doesn’t lie back. He frowns, and Dorian frowns back, and they frown at each other a moment while Bull wonders why Dorian’s letting a fat hard cock like that go to waste so he can mother hen Bull’s worst joint. Bull says, “Thought you weren’t a healer.”

“I’m no spirit healer, if that’s what you’re afraid of,” Dorian replies stiffly. “I am capable of a great many things without magic. I can count to ten without using my fingers, I can find my way around Skyhold, I can even dress myself. Wonder of wonders, how does the mage do it.” Bull’s offended him, which is rare these days. It’s harder than you’d think, harder still to make right.

Bull grabs Dorian’s wrist. Sort of. Bull means to grab Dorian’s wrist, but the gesture comes out a little too soft, a little too slow. It’s a tender sort of touch. Bull’s thumb slips down to press into the palm of Dorian’s hands. They both look down at their joined hands. They both look surprised.

“I know you’re good with your hands,” Bull says. He leers and Dorian rolls his eyes, but there’s still something strange about the moment. Something fragile.

Bull’s not stupid or shy or bashful or anything like that—his body’s been a tool for so long, the means to innumerable ends, that false modesty could be lethal. He knows what his body is, what it can do. Knows Dorian likes it, likes what it can do. Dorian likes the way it keeps him safe in battle and fucks him good at night, two tasks Bull would happily die doing. But this isn’t either of those things. This is the post-coital, pre-exit. This is lingering without purpose, and Bull knows himself, knows what he does, and he’s never been great at the moments without purpose.

Dorian extricates himself from Bull’s grip like he’s caressing rather than escaping, and rests both hands on Bull’s thigh, above ever-present pinched burning of his knee. “It works better if you’d let me heat my hands,” Dorian says, which is a crazy thought because it’s not like Dorian doesn’t sear Bull every time they touch. “But the principle is the same either way.”

“You don’t have to do this,” Bull replies.

Dorian looks at Bull as if he were insane. “When have I ever done something I don’t wish to do?” And Bull has answers for that, oh does he, because Dorian talks a better game of hedonistic self-indulgence than he lets himself play, but then Dorian squeezes Bull’s thigh, and the quiet delight that Bull sees more and more these days flickers across Dorian’s face. Dorian loves Bull’s thighs—he’s pretty fucking vocal about that in bed—but sometimes he pets them or Bull’s arms or Bull’s back or Bull’s brow like… Bull isn’t sure. Like Dorian pets that goddamn creepy bog unicorn of his when he thinks no one is looking, no one can see him sneak his morbid death pet an extra treat of rotten meat. As if he couldn’t be fonder of this strange creature in front of him.

As Dorian sweeps his hands up and down Bull’s thighs, over the twists and burns and scars and aches and breaks and where the skin stretches too tight and shiny where it healed as best it could under the circumstances Bull had, he thinks, maybe it’s a necromancer thing. To be so enamored with what happens when the flesh goes wrong.  

There’s not one scar on Dorian’s perfect body. Bull’s looked, and been both pleased and disappointed by their absence. Dorian gets hurt but then Dorian gets healed. He keeps his barriers up to keep the worst of it away. Chugs health potions. Goes to Vivienne for healing, uses the lotions she prescribes. He ought to have a gash up half his left thigh, when a red templar's blade nearly bled him out in the Hinterlands. Cadash sewed up what potions couldn't heal. It ought to have scarred. But Dorian treated it right, half medicine, half magic, all elegant determination to be left unmarred. He doesn't have a scar there now, seven months later. Just a line where the hair hasn't grown back and probably never will.

“Let me take care of you,” Dorian says. “As you always take care of me.”

Dorian is mostly soft now. If Bull could get him into his mouth, he could change that, coax Dorian back to where he was last night, writhing on the bed as he tugged Bull’s fingers, what’s left of Bull’s fingers, into his mouth to try to muffle the keening they both knew could float so easily through the walls, and Dorian’s shy about that stuff but less than he used to be, he hardly blushes when Bull’s boys tease him, and Bull’s boys don’t put any barbs in their teasing anymore, but still, as Dorian told Bull earlier that night, they should keep it down because Sera’s right downstairs tonight and she informs Dorian that he and Bull together were hell on her sleep. As Dorian had recounted in a surprisingly good impression, _Ain’t fair robbing sleep because you two doors spend all night jiggling knobs and squeaking for oil._ Bull smiles at the memory. “I like taking care of you.”

“So then you can imagine why I might be keen to take my turn.” Dorian smirks, or tries too. It’s another gesture that comes too soft. It stutters, and Bull realizes Dorian’s afraid. Afraid of Bull, he thinks immediately, and the panic/guilt/shame _wild animal left the Qun and look how it scares the man he—_

Bull doesn’t let himself finish that sentence. But he’s not stupid either. Even when he wants to be.

This isn’t fear like that. This is something else, something he’s seen Dorian wear a few times and only with him, when he ran into Bull after the first time they fucked and he no longer knew what the etiquette of their relationship was, in the early days when Dorian began to linger after sex but wasn’t sure he had permission to stay, when they’re in bed and someone’s buried in the other and they’re face to face and Dorian opens his mouth before he closes it and keeps his words to himself. It’s the look Dorian gets when he wants more than what he thinks he’s allowed to get.

“You can’t keep all the fun to yourself,” Dorian says, his eyes darting away from Bull’s to sweep down across the whole of Bull’s body, and Bull thinks, with an unfamiliar wistfulness, that he wishes he could see his own body in the beautiful, useless the way Dorian must see it, for a look that sweet to sneak onto his face.

“Okay,” Bull says.

Dorian raises his gaze. “Okay?”

“Yeah.” Bull leans back as Dorian had asked. “Take care of me.”

Dorian cocks his head as if listening for teasing. When it isn’t there, he smiles with his mouth, while his eyes do something else. Something more than smiling, for something more than fondness. “Well, good,” Dorian says, settling his elegant burning hands on Bull’s shitty fucking knee like divine benediction. “If you won’t take care of yourself, truly someone must.”

**Author's Note:**

> Title (and a hell of a lot of inspiration) from this poem: 
> 
> i like my body when it is with your  
> body. It is so quite new a thing.  
> Muscles better and nerves more.  
> i like your body. i like what it does,  
> i like its hows. i like to feel the spine  
> of your body and its bones, and the trembling  
> -firm-smooth ness and which i will  
> again and again and again  
> kiss, i like kissing this and that of you,  
> i like, slowing stroking the, shocking fuzz  
> of your electric fur, and what-is-it comes  
> over parting flesh . . . . And eyes big love-crumbs
> 
> and possibly i like the thrill
> 
> of under me you quite so new
> 
> \--ee cummings  
>  


End file.
